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John Williams begins recording Star Wars Episode VIII score today in Los Angeles


TownerFan

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  • 4 weeks later...
On 12/13/2016 at 8:08 AM, TownerFan said:

 

Oh, more "pieces parts AOTC film making", tweaking everything to death and then calling Johnny in when it's time to score the next 2 minutes over five days?

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Munich was pretty restrained and short compared to his other 3 scores in 2005, but it was still an incredible effort. The last time he did 4 scores in a year, too.

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10 minutes ago, Stefancos said:

Indeed, though that has nothing to do with 2002 and AOTC.

 

Whoops!

 

Well, nonetheless, it was another 4-score year! :lol: Besides, everyone knows William Ross wrote COS!

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Stefan, why do you think sheet music in John Williams handwriting is an indication William Ross wrote the score? Are you suggesting he mailed it to JW to rewrite in his own handwriting? 

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  • 4 weeks later...

This is really exciting! (both the fact that there are sessions going on and the Johnson process info) :woop:

 

However, I think it's worth nothing that wasn't this basically J.J.'s approach to, in some respects?

 

I mean, they started recording the score in June. Why would they need to do that if the scenes were going to be edited significantly after the sessions? (and we know that happened, judging by how many edits and inserts there are!) I'd presume the reason would be so that J.J. could use the music to help him better edit his scenes and visualize the final product. 

 

So could Johnson's process not really be anything new?

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But is the movie really being "cut around the score"?

 

They've been editing since August, and only recording since December!

 

I do see what you're saying, though.

 

I just wonder if this could be more about Rian editing to the "tone" of the music, but not the specific sync points. "Using music to help find the tone" is perhaps something like how J.J. was working at times. 

 

I guess this is all kind of pointless to discuss absent further info, though, LOL. 

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So these sessions were the most 'expensive mockups or temp track ever..in some way.

 

He said williams to record what he had so he could use it to temp track the film....

 

I fear the score is going to be hacked in this film.  :/

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Yeah, that was one of the things I was considering - that Johnson might just be using this as temp track, essentially, to help him with the mood, not necessarily as something to precisely edit the picture to.

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Yep, exactly. 

 

I want to be optimistic, of course, but after TFA I've realized that early recording doesn't necessarily preclude extensive microediting (not to mention inserts, rewrites, and tracking). 

 

Particularly if you include rewrites and inserts as "mangling" of the score, then early recording means probably much more of that. 

 

If a cue is written and recorded in fall/winter 2016/2017, and the scene is constantly edited until the next December...

 

A side question for those who remember: Was extensive film editing noticeable upon watching TPM in theaters? I.e. did you leave going, "Wow, this score is a mess!" 

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16 hours ago, Will said:

A side question for those who remember: Was extensive film editing noticeable upon watching TPM in theaters? I.e. did you leave going, "Wow, this score is a mess!" 

Yes, very noticeable and very irritating.  I was much more disappointed with Lucas on the music chopping (in the last act at least) than other elements of the movie, such as Jar Jar. 

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Hmm, and with TFA while there was a ton of film microediting, not to mention inserts, tracking, and rewrites, it wasn't really noticeable -- in fact, most thought the score was treated really well after watching in theaters IIRC.

 

Obviously the level of editing on TPM doesn't happen with every score recorded closer to release date, but....

 

Maybe the early recordings helped with TFA's being well treated (facially). 

 

I.e. perhaps J.J. had a general "conception" of each major scene that the early-recording bits of score solidified, so while he made lots of minor edits he had no inclination to dramatically restructure any of the film/score? 

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The opening cue in particular "Attack On The Jakku Village, Part 1", is clearly stitched together from several different versions of the cues written for that particular sequence and it sounds pretty seamless, as though that was the intention. It's as if the cues were written in such a way that parts of them could be swapped out as needed.

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4 hours ago, Gistech said:

The score to TFA sounded like it was modular, so that they could do editing without it being too noticeable.

 

That's definitely been a general Williams trend with his action music since probably The Lost World. Ironically that score was also butchered.

 

He made a clear attempt to write long-lined thematic action material for TPM and it was butchered to hell. AOTC had a very different approach to the action music than TPM and he's mostly continued this style in scores for TFA, Minority Report, War of the Worlds, Tintin, etc.

 

I think he adjusts this style depending on the state of the film when he starts scoring and how likely the director is to meddle with the score. For example, his action music in War Horse is in a completely different style than the aforementioned scores from the same period.

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11 hours ago, crumbs said:

 

That's definitely been a general Williams trend with his action music since probably The Lost World. Ironically that score was also butchered.

 

He made a clear attempt to write long-lined thematic action material for TPM and it was butchered to hell. AOTC had a very different approach to the action music than TPM and he's mostly continued this style in scores for TFA, Minority Report, War of the Worlds, Tintin, etc.

 

I think he adjusts this style depending on the state of the film when he starts scoring and how likely the director is to meddle with the score. For example, his action music in War Horse is in a completely different style than the aforementioned scores from the same period.

 

Well, I Can Fly Anything is also very much in that vein. ;)

 

I'm really not familiar enough with JW's output to judge whether there's been a change, but it's interesting to consider.

 

One thing I do wonder...

 

Is there any chance that this supposed change is really simply due to JW's internal artistic instincts? 

 

I'd be interested in hearing from the really musical people here on this. 

 

For instance, I'm not sure if it's always been this way, but some recent concert works of his have had some really "crazy" passages -- total orchestral madness (possibly even "atonality"?)

 

Could JW have just had an artistic instinct to go a little more "crazy" and seemingly less structured? 

 

I'm just rambling here from a point of low musical intelligence, of course, so I could be totally off base here.

 

Just something that came to mind as a possibility.  

 

11 hours ago, Manikin Skywalker said:

I'm curious to see how a TFA 'complete score' would look. Probably hundreds and hundreds of inserts, 5 discs worth of them!

 

We might already have most from the docs, I don't know.

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Well there's been a huge evolution in his action writing style over the years but he's also a chameleon writer generally. The BFG proved he can seamlessly slip back into a writing style we thought he left behind 15 years ago.

 

The interesting thing about Star Wars is that every score still sounds uniquely 'Star Wars-ian' while being uniquely different from the score that came before it.

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And that's the reason why he needs one more! Getting 4 Lifetime Achievement Awards is quite an achievement in a lifetime, and it thus needs to be rewarded with a Lifetime Achievement Oscars!

 

The Lifetime Achievement Oscar to end all Lifetime Achievement Oscars!

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9 minutes ago, Stefancos said:

Why would JW get a lifetime achievement Oscar? He's already got 4 proper ones.

I think the idea is one for IX would serve as both a recognition of the score and his career in general. 

 

Oscars really do not matter at this point.  He received the AFI award, which is much more prestigious than Oscars ever could be in terms of Hollywood recognition. 

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